# The Berlin File (베를린)
**The Berlin File** (베를린, *Bereullin*) is a 2013 South Korean spy action thriller directed and written by Ryoo Seung-wan, in which North and South Korean intelligence agents clash in Berlin after an illegal arms deal goes wrong.[1](https://www.koreanfilm.or.kr/eng/films/index/filmsView.jsp?movieCd=20124083) It was one of the most high-profile South Korean releases of early 2013, drew more than 7 million admissions, and helped open a 2010s wave of glossy Korean espionage cinema.[2](https://www.screendaily.com/-the-berlin-file/5050979.article) • [3](https://sightlines.media/film/160704/the-berlin-file-2013/reception)
| Key fact | Detail |
|---|---|
| Director / writer | Ryoo Seung-wan (also credited with English dialogue alongside Ted Geoghegan)[1](https://www.koreanfilm.or.kr/eng/films/index/filmsView.jsp?movieCd=20124083) • [3](https://sightlines.media/film/160704/the-berlin-file-2013/reception) |
| Release | January 30, 2013 (South Korea); February 15, 2013 (North America)[1](https://www.koreanfilm.or.kr/eng/films/index/filmsView.jsp?movieCd=20124083) • [4](https://www.soompi.com/article/479407wpp/movie-review-the-berlin-file) |
| Running time | 120 minutes (121 minutes at 24 frames per second)[1](https://www.koreanfilm.or.kr/eng/films/index/filmsView.jsp?movieCd=20124083) • [5](https://www.filmdienst.de/film/details/542113/the-berlin-file) |
| Main cast | Ha Jung-woo (Pyo Jong-seong), Han Suk-kyu (Jung Jin-soo), Ryoo Seung-bum (Dong Myung-soo), Gianna Jun (Ryun Jung-hee)[1](https://www.koreanfilm.or.kr/eng/films/index/filmsView.jsp?movieCd=20124083) |
| Box office | 7,166,199 admissions and $38,964,228 gross in South Korea; 4th-highest-grossing Korean film of 2013[1](https://www.koreanfilm.or.kr/eng/films/index/filmsView.jsp?movieCd=20124083) • [6](https://keastwest.or.kr/homepage/boardMedia/93985) |
| Budget | 10 billion won (about $9.35 million)[7](https://www.koreajoongangdaily.com/lifestyle/berlin-file-mixes-korean-intrigue-cold-war-backdrop/10457400) |
| Locations | Shot on location in Berlin, Germany, and Riga, Latvia[2](https://www.screendaily.com/-the-berlin-file/5050979.article) |
| Critical scores | 43% Tomatometer (14 reviews) and 58% Popcornmeter on Rotten Tomatoes[8](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_berlin_file) |
## Spoilers
### Plot
The film opens with an illegal arms deal in a Berlin hotel, negotiated by Pyo Jong-seong ([Ha Jung-woo](https://www.edgepedia.org/ha-jung-woo)), a North Korean agent representing his government with a Russian arms dealer and the leader of an "Anti-Imperialist Arab League." Men claiming to be from Israel's Mossad attack the meeting, and the deal collapses.[4](https://www.soompi.com/article/479407wpp/movie-review-the-berlin-file) Pyo, an unidentifiable operative known as a "ghost" whose information appears on no intelligence database, flees across the rooftops of the German capital while Jung Jin-soo ([Han Suk-kyu](https://www.edgepedia.org/han-suk-kyu)), a South Korean National Intelligence Service agent who was surveilling the deal, pursues him.[1](https://www.koreanfilm.or.kr/eng/films/index/filmsView.jsp?movieCd=20124083)
Suspecting a leak from within the North Korean embassy, Pyo begins his own investigation, and suspicion falls on the ambassador and on his own wife, Ryun Jung-hee (Gianna Jun), a translator at the embassy. The couple's marriage is already strained, and Ryun wishes to return to [North Korea](https://www.edgepedia.org/north-korea).[4](https://www.soompi.com/article/479407wpp/movie-review-the-berlin-file) Pyongyang dispatches another operative, Dong Myung-soo (Ryoo Seung-bum), to Berlin to purge Pyo, take control of the embassy, and frame Ryun for treason.[1](https://www.koreanfilm.or.kr/eng/films/index/filmsView.jsp?movieCd=20124083) Torn between his wife and his country, Pyo sets out to learn the truth while hunted by the South Koreans, his own side, and, in the film's larger conspiracy, the CIA; the stakes include secret accounts linked to the late Kim Jong-il, which the critic Rob Humanick of *Slant Magazine* describes as a $4 billion bank account.[9](https://www.slantmagazine.com/film/the-berlin-file) The film ends with Pyo, abandoned by both North and South Korea, leaving for [Vladivostok](https://www.edgepedia.org/vladivostok).[10](https://news.sbs.co.kr/news/endPage.do?news_id=N1008432284)
## Production
**Origins.** Ryoo Seung-wan conceived the film after visiting the [Berlin International Film Festival](https://www.edgepedia.org/berlin-international-film-festival) following *The Unjust* (2010). He said he was struck by Berlin as the city that symbolized 20th-century division, by the maze-like spaces of the Holocaust Memorial, which suggested a mirror-room chase sequence in the manner of [Orson Welles](https://www.edgepedia.org/orson-welles)'s *The Lady from Shanghai* (1947), and by the North Korean embassy in Berlin, which he described as the largest North Korean embassy in the world.[11](https://www.koreanfilm.or.kr/webzine/sub/feature.jsp?mode=A_VIEW&wbSeq=92)
**Locations and crew.** The film was shot almost entirely on location in Berlin and in Riga, Latvia, with winter location photography that reviewers noted sets it apart from other Korean spy thrillers and heightens the loneliness of its undercover characters.[2](https://www.screendaily.com/-the-berlin-file/5050979.article) • [3](https://sightlines.media/film/160704/the-berlin-file-2013/reception) Choi Young-hwan was the cinematographer, Jo Yeong-wook composed the music, Kim Sang-beom and Kim Jae-beom edited, and the stunt direction was by Jung Doo-hong.[5](https://www.filmdienst.de/film/details/542113/the-berlin-file) • [2](https://www.screendaily.com/-the-berlin-file/5050979.article) Production companies were Filmmaker R&K and CJ E&M, with Film Base Berlin handling service production in Germany; CJ [Entertainment](https://www.edgepedia.org/entertainment) distributed.[2](https://www.screendaily.com/-the-berlin-file/5050979.article) • [12](https://www.crew-united.com/en/The-Berlin-File__157995.html) Because much of the dialogue is in English, alongside Korean and German, the production hired the American filmmaker Ted Geoghegan to polish the English lines.[3](https://sightlines.media/film/160704/the-berlin-file-2013/reception)
**Casting.** The four leads were among Korea's best-known actors: Ha Jung-woo, Han Suk-kyu, Gianna Jun, and Ryoo Seung-bum, the director's younger brother and longtime collaborator, who plays the North Korean antagonist. Ryoo called the group his dream spy line-up, though he said the star cast placed heavy pressure on him.[2](https://www.screendaily.com/-the-berlin-file/5050979.article) • [3](https://sightlines.media/film/160704/the-berlin-file-2013/reception) • [7](https://www.koreajoongangdaily.com/lifestyle/berlin-file-mixes-korean-intrigue-cold-war-backdrop/10457400) It was the fifth film on which the Ryoo brothers had worked together.[7](https://www.koreajoongangdaily.com/lifestyle/berlin-file-mixes-korean-intrigue-cold-war-backdrop/10457400)
## Style and influences
Ryoo openly aimed to emulate the propulsive action of the Bourne series, and he also named older touchstones: *The Spy Who Came in from the Cold* (1965), [Michael Caine](https://www.edgepedia.org/michael-caine)'s Harry Palmer film *The Ipcress File* (1965), *The Third Man* (1949) as a model for shadowy divided-city atmosphere, and the 1970s paranoid thrillers *Three Days of the Condor* (1975) and *The Conversation* (1974).[3](https://sightlines.media/film/160704/the-berlin-file-2013/reception) Reviewers repeatedly made the same comparison; *Film at Lincoln Center* called it "a Korean installment in the Bourne franchise," and Jason Bechervaise in *Screen Daily* drew a line to the 1999 Korean spy thriller *Shiri*, which had combined Hollywood-style action with a narrative tailored to local audiences.[13](https://www.filmlinc.org/films/the-berlin-file/) • [2](https://www.screendaily.com/-the-berlin-file/5050979.article)
The action set pieces, orchestrated by Ryoo with Choi Young-hwan and Jung Doo-hong, were the film's most praised element. *Slant Magazine* singled out an early, bloodless restroom scuffle and an apartment brawl ending with the protagonist "functioning as an impromptu wrecking ball"; the apartment fight and rooftop-and-wire sequences remain the scenes fans most often clip and share.[9](https://www.slantmagazine.com/film/the-berlin-file) • [3](https://sightlines.media/film/160704/the-berlin-file-2013/reception)
## Reception and box office
The film opened in South Korea on January 30, 2013, timed to the [Lunar New Year](https://www.edgepedia.org/lunar-new-year) holiday, and became Ryoo's biggest hit to that point with over 7 million admissions.[2](https://www.screendaily.com/-the-berlin-file/5050979.article) • [3](https://sightlines.media/film/160704/the-berlin-file-2013/reception) KOFIC's year-end tally places it 4th among 2013 Korean films, with 7,166,199 admissions and a 5.8% share of box-office revenue, behind *Miracle in Cell No. 7*, *Snowpiercer*, and *The Face Reader*; it also outgrossed *Secretly Greatly*, the other North Korean spy film of the same season.[6](https://keastwest.or.kr/homepage/boardMedia/93985) • [3](https://sightlines.media/film/160704/the-berlin-file-2013/reception)
Critical response was divided along a consistent line. Reviewers praised the choreographed action and the performances, particularly Ha Jung-woo's portrayal of the hunted agent, while finding the plot convoluted: *Screen Daily* called the narrative "overly convoluted," *Time Out* (4 of 5 stars) said a primer in Korean peninsula politics would help but that the action and emotional core keep the film gripping, and the *Los Angeles Times* found "something sharp, exciting and more original" within a film that "all feels somehow misshapen."[2](https://www.screendaily.com/-the-berlin-file/5050979.article) • [14](https://www.timeout.com/movies/the-berlin-file) • [8](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_berlin_file) On Rotten Tomatoes the film holds 43% among critics and 58% among audiences.[8](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_berlin_file) Sightlines summarizes the standing debate as whether it is a top-tier action showcase hampered by an impenetrable spy plot, or whether the le Carré-style murk is the point; it reads today as connective tissue in Ryoo's run from *The Unjust* to *Veteran*, respected by genre fans but overshadowed by *Veteran* (2015).[3](https://sightlines.media/film/160704/the-berlin-file-2013/reception)
## Context and legacy
The film arrived in a 2013 season when Korean cinema produced an unusual cluster of North Korea spy stories: the low-budget comedy *Red Family* and the big-budget thrillers *Commitment* and *The Suspect*, with *The Berlin File* first out of the gate.[3](https://sightlines.media/film/160704/the-berlin-file-2013/reception) Scholars have read it as an allegory of anxiety on the Korean peninsula, set in the symbolic city of Cold War division, and as a story of agents made expendable by power struggles.[15](https://www.kci.go.kr/kciportal/landing/article.kci?arti_id=ART001865697)
Ryoo has kept the film alive within his own filmography. In 2026 he said his espionage film *HUMINT*, set in Vladivostok, exists in the same universe, since *The Berlin File* ends with Pyo heading to that city; a character reference to Pyo in *HUMINT* rewards viewers who remember the earlier film.[10](https://news.sbs.co.kr/news/endPage.do?news_id=N1008432284)
## References
1. [The Berlin File (2013), KOFIC Korean Film Database](https://www.koreanfilm.or.kr/eng/films/index/filmsView.jsp?movieCd=20124083)
2. [Jason Bechervaise, "The Berlin File," Screen Daily (23 January 2013)](https://www.screendaily.com/-the-berlin-file/5050979.article)
3. ["How The Berlin File was received," Sightlines](https://sightlines.media/film/160704/the-berlin-file-2013/reception)
4. ["[Movie Review] The Berlin File," Soompi (7 March 2013)](https://www.soompi.com/article/479407wpp/movie-review-the-berlin-file)
5. ["The Berlin File," Filmdienst](https://www.filmdienst.de/film/details/542113/the-berlin-file)
6. [2013 Korean box office table, KOFIC data reproduced in Korean Journal of East-West Comparative Literature](https://keastwest.or.kr/homepage/boardMedia/93985)
7. ["'Berlin File' mixes Korean intrigue, cold war backdrop," Korea JoongAng Daily](https://www.koreajoongangdaily.com/lifestyle/berlin-file-mixes-korean-intrigue-cold-war-backdrop/10457400)
8. [The Berlin File, Rotten Tomatoes](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_berlin_file)
9. [Rob Humanick, "Review: The Berlin File," Slant Magazine (14 February 2013)](https://www.slantmagazine.com/film/the-berlin-file)
10. ["'HUMINT' Shares a Universe with 'The Berlin File'," SBS News (2026)](https://news.sbs.co.kr/news/endPage.do?news_id=N1008432284)
11. [PARK Hye-eun, "2013 Global Project BIG 3 - THE BERLIN FILE," Korean Cinema Today](https://www.koreanfilm.or.kr/webzine/sub/feature.jsp?mode=A_VIEW&wbSeq=92)
12. [The Berlin File, Crew United](https://www.crew-united.com/en/The-Berlin-File__157995.html)
13. [The Berlin File, Film at Lincoln Center](https://www.filmlinc.org/films/the-berlin-file/)
14. [James M Sherrard, "The Berlin File," Time Out (12 February 2013)](https://www.timeout.com/movies/the-berlin-file)
15. [HAN Sang-eon, "Anxiety on the Korean Peninsula Looked at through Berlin," Contemporary Film Studies (2014)](https://www.kci.go.kr/kciportal/landing/article.kci?arti_id=ART001865697)
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